Sunday, 3 July 2016

Tonight I'd like to share with you a step by step guide to making a cover for a journal. I used a fabric version of paper piecing with fabrics that I printed on my Gelli® Plate. Of late, I seem to be including fabric into my work more than paper and although paper piecing could be used for this project, I figured that the benefits of using fabric would be two fold. First of all, it would be longer lasting than paper and would also be a lot more flexible.

Step One: I cut a piece of calico for the base of my journal cover. I allowed an extra 5cm at the top and bottom and 8cm on both sides.

{Tip of the day: I have mixed a little Fabric/ Textile Medium into my Fresco Finish paints which not only extends the drying time but allows the fabric to remain flexible, and makes the paint permanent for washing once heat set too.}Step Two: I love using my Gelli® Plate but am not particularly keen on all the white space left behind from the stencils. There are a few ways to overcome this but this is my favourite method...

This is how it looks before printing (I have no idea why the paint now looks yellow!!!), then I took a print with the fabric

Here's a close up shot of how the printed fabric looks. Although there is a little bit of white space, it is no longer bold areas, much more muted and to my liking.

Step Three: This is another of my favourite Gelli® Plate techniques. I used some bold stamps from my very first plate of stamps designed for PaperArtsy, ELB01 to remove some paint from my Gelli® Plate.

Step Four: My third and final Gelli® Plate/paint technique. I brayered a mix of Tango, Caramel and Chocolate pudding on to my Gelli® Plate. Arranged my stencils.

Used a textured sheet of paper towel to remove some of the paint.

And printed on to a piece of fabric that had already been printed using the first technique.

Step Five: Once I had a good selection of fabrics using the above techniques, I cut them up into random sized squares and rectangles. I used a piece of Heat'n'Bond between the calico and squares of fabric to enable me to iron them in place.

Step Six: I used a zig zag stitch on my sewing machine around each square. At This point I wished I had cut the fabrics into shapes of the same size, it would have made this step a lot faster! Once I had finished though, I was pleased with the result, it does look better with a random pattern.

Step Seven: I folded the top and bottom edges leaving the journal cover approx 0.5 cm bigger than the journal on those edges.

Step Eight: I cut away a triangle from each corner to avoid the underneath edge showing when it was folded.

Step Nine: Once folded, I hand stitched these flaps across the top and bottom, leaving the long edge open to allow the journal to be slipped in and out of the cover.

I love how this project turned out but I had intended to make a feature panel from one of the images below but when I tried to arrange them on the front of the journal, they were way too big! They covered too many of my patchwork squares. I enjoyed this project and will definitely make another of these but next time I will incorporate the feature panels into the patchwork.

I hope this project inspires you to dig out your Gelli® Plates and start creating a stash of fabric and papers that you could then use to piece together and cover pretty much any project you have in mind.

This looks fabulous Lin, such great colours and a brilliant array of techniques. Patchwork like this is always so effective whether in paper or fabric. Thanks for sharing. ~Darcy

We would love to see how you interpret this topic by linking what you make to our 2016 Challenge #13: Paper Piecing, on this page HERE.

All of our bloggers love to see your twist on their ideas, particularly if you were directly inspired by their post.

All challenge links go in the draw to win a £50 voucher to spend on products of your choice from the PaperArtsy online store. The Paper Piecing link will close 17:00 (London Time) Sunday, July 10th 2016. The winner will be announced 1 hour later at 18:00.

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Even though we've been blogging for quite some time only just figured out the followers button, so please follow us to hear about all that is new in the land of PaperArtsy. We'd love to share our ideas with you! Leandra